| From WorldWrestlingInsanity.com Raw Raw was from the Sheffield Arena in Sheffield, England, tonight. To refresh our memories, two weeks (and seemingly a lifetime) ago Eric Bischoff banished Edge to Smackdown to take on Batista. It was all a ruse, however, and was actually a little inter-promotional stage-setting for Survivor Series. The announcers for the evening were the diminutive Joey Styles, Jerry "The King" Lawler, and Jonathan Coachman. Team Raw (Shawn Michaels, Kane, Big Show, Chris Masters, and Carlito) headed to the ring in their street clothes. Bischoff introduced the team and promised victory for Team Raw. He said it was rumored that Team Smackdown would show up on Raw tonight. (Imagine that.) With a straight face, he claimed not to believe the rumor. Todd Grisham was stationed in the parking lot awaiting the Smackdown invasion. Eric's said his army would take care of them if they showed up. Big Show grabbed the mic and said they were not his army; they were there because they wanted to be. Too bad about Batista getting hurt and all--wrong place, wrong guy, wrong time. Grisham cut in to announce the arrival of Batista, Teddy Long, Rey Mysterio, Randy Orton, and JBL, whose limo they'd arrived in. Bischoff went into panic mode. HBK assured him that Team Raw was on the way to take care of business. A sputtering Bischoff ordered them all back into the ring. They ignored him. (Commercial break) Team Smackdown was in the parking lot, rolling up their sleeves. Team Raw was headed to the parking lot, rolling up their sleeves (those that had sleeves, since Kane and Big Show didn't have sleeves to roll up). Cue the "West Side Story" rumble music. The two teams stood toe to toe, then the fists began to fly. Masters had Mysterio in the Masterpiece, but off camera there was the sound of glass breaking. When the camera panned over to show what had happened, Batista was shown on a broken car windshield, clutching his shoulder. (Commercial break) Grisham was alone in the parking lot, explaining that Kane and Big Show had chokeslammed Batista through the windshield. Batista had been taken to one of those generic "medical facilities." The announcers wondered what that will mean to Team Smackdown at Survivor Series. What indeed. (1) Ric Flair vs. Trevor Murdoch. As elegant as Flair looked in his bejeweled robe, Murdoch looked like he just fell off the proverbial turnip truck (and just about pulled a "Vader" getting into the ring). Decent match. Lots of "whoo's" and chops from Flair, who won it by grabbing Murdoch's tights and rolling him up for the win. Your winner: Ric Flair. Murdoch chased the referee up the ramp, complaining about the dirtiest player in the game's dirty trick. The ref didn't want to hear it. Triple H appeared on the TitanTron with a message and a threat for Flair about their Survivor Series match. (Commercial break) Returning from commercial Tajiri was in mid-match and putting someone in the Tarantula when JBL stormed the ring, thus ending the match (such as it was). JBL called Chris Masters out. Bischoff appeared on the stage and called him either the dumbest man on earth or the bravest. Bischoff said he was probably the former and offered him a match with HBK tonight. The crowd loved that. (Commercial break) John Cena was shown taping an episode of "Mad TV" which will air this coming Saturday. Kurt Angle headed to the ring with the "you sucks" bleeped out--annoying, to say the least. (2) Kurt Angle vs. Shelton Benjamin. Part III. Shawn Daivari came out as the special guest referee. (Give that guy some new entrance music!) Angle was pleased, but Benjamin wasn't. As with their previous matches, it was a technical grudge match. Benjamin DDT'd Angle off the apron, but Angle got back into the ring and put Benjamin in a prolonged ankle lock. Benjamin managed to reverse the hold and roll Angle up for a pin, but Angle rolled Benjamin up for the one-two-three. Your winner: Kurt Angle. (Commercial break) Angle was still in the ring and began to explain why he is associating himself with Daivari. Daivari is a proud American, he said, just like Angle. Emphasis on American. And from now on, Daivari would be Angle's own personal referee, including his match at Survivor Series against John Cena. Daivari grabbed the mic and shouted something in Farsi (I think), which was probably what Angle had just said. Cena appeared on the TitanTron and said he was going to find out the real story about Kurt Angle and went looking backstage for people to comment on whether Angle sucked or not. He opened a door and it turned out to be the ladies dressing room. Candice Michelle gave him a peep show and made a crude joke about sucking. Cena opened another door and found Snitsky giving Tomko a massage. I was getting creeped out. So was Cena. "It's not my fault," Snitsky told him. Cena opened yet another door and found the Boogeyman singing a nursery rhyme. Cena couldn't believe what he was seeing. Neither could I. Cena finally quit opening doors and headed out to the ring. The crowd was chanting his name and he jumped into the crowd to get their opinions of Kurt Angle. The comments were unanimously suckey. Cena concluded that Angle still sucked, and with that, he jumped into the ring and sent Angle and Daivari flying. (Commercial break) (3) Triple H vs. Val Venis. Not much doubt as to who was going to win this one, even thought Venis looked good. Triple H quickly laid him out with a steel chair, and the ref called for the bell. But this was all about sending a message to Flair for their match this Sunday, and Triple H beat the snot out of Venis as the referee continued to ring the bell signaling a DQ. The carnage ended with a Pedigree. Bischoff was in his office when he got a message that Theodore Long was outside demanding to see him. "Show him in," said Evil Eric, twirling his imaginary moustache. (Somewhere along the way, this turned into a match for Survivor Series, too--Eric the Karate Kid vs. Teddy Long.) (Commercial break) We were told that the HBK vs. JBL match would be a lumberjack match. (4) Candice Michelle (with Victoria) vs. Mickie James (with Trish Stratus). This ought to be good. *Rolling eyes* After some of the worst "wrestling" in the history of sports entertainment, two masked men abducted Trish. The distraction led to interference by Victoria, and Candice pinned Mickie for the win. (Commercial break) What was the point of the match? It was a "clever" ploy to set up an inter-promotional women's match at Survivor Series. So where was Trish? Tied up in some dark corner of the arena. It turns out that her abductors were MNM, and Melina, who wanted a match at Survivor Series for the Women's Title. The camera focused on the announcers, all of whom had their mouths hanging open. Lawler finally got up and went to help Trish. Maria was reading a book and waiting for Shawn Michaels to show up for his interview. It was HBK's book, coincidentally. Available in bookstores everywhere. He talked some smack to the Smackdown lumberjacks. (Commercial break) (5) Inter-promotional Lumberjack Match: Shawn Michaels vs. JBL. HBK was accompanied by Big Show, Kane, Carlito and Chris Masters. JBL had only three lumberjacks to watch his back--Randy Orton, Bobby Lashley, and Rey Mysterio. The match got underway with traded punches, then each took turns controlling the match. HBK seemed to have the upper hand and started to tune up for the Sweet Chin Music. Team Smackdown pulled JBL out of harm's way, but Michaels leapt out of the ring and landed on all of them. Splat. Back in the ring, JBL was ready for the Clothesline from Hell. But HBK was ready, too, and leveled him with a boot to the chops. The lumberjacks hit the ring and it turned into a brawl. What did you expect? As the show ended, Batista, with his shoulder bandaged, hit the ring and came after Big Show and Kane. Batista had a score to settle and gave Show a spinebuster, injury notwithstanding. Very impressive. So there you have it. Raw set the table for Survivor Series, but I think they spilled some metaphorical gravy on the tablecloth in a few places. Enjoy your turkey dinner on Thursday and let's hope that Survivor Series won't be a turkey, too. Happy Thanksgiving everybody! ***
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